Xbox One Sales Double in US Now Kinect Isn't Mandatory

"Over the past month, we've seen a strong spike in interest in our Xbox One console options, including the new $399 offering, and the amazing lineup of games announced during E3," says Microsoft. The Xbox maker would prefer to think this is thanks to the amazing new games coming this summer, but according to its own figures the spike starts from June 9th. What happened then? It stopped making the Kinect a mandatory part of the package, that's what happened then.

The Xbox One's price dropped to $399.99 without the Kinect, which also helped move units since one of the real problems since launch had been the unfavorable price point comparison with the PS4. Microsoft's figures only represent US trends, but it's likely a similar sales spike is taking place in its other markets.

CEO Satya Nadella recently reaffirmed that Xbox has a place in Microsoft's universe; it's not part of the company's core business, but hardware is a useful testing ground for its software ideas. Microsoft has said again and again that the Kinect is a core part of the Xbox experience, so you shouldn't expect this sales number revelation to change things at Microsoft. The Kinect is still part of Microsoft's world vision, even if it isn't part of yours.

Microsoft also reports steady growth in Xbox 360 sales, which oughtn't to come as a huge surprise. The console was expected to hang around after the Xbox One's launch, and what with it having a huge back catalog of titles, being significantly cheaper than the new console, and - until recently - being the only Xbox console not to ship with Kinect as standard, the 360 must seem attractive to a lot of gamers even now.